


Lazarus

by xShadowPhantom



Category: Batman (Comics), Batman - All Media Types
Genre: Angst, Bruce isn't as emotionally constipated as usual, Character Study, Depression, Gen, Jason Todd Has Issues, Sort Of, Suicidal Thoughts, Suicide Attempt, but he's still pretty emotionally constipated, someone help him please
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-25
Updated: 2017-08-25
Packaged: 2018-12-19 22:26:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,723
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11907471
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/xShadowPhantom/pseuds/xShadowPhantom
Summary: Jason Todd, Lazarus. They're connected.(trigger warning for depression, suicidal thoughts, contemplation of suicide, and suicide attempt)





	Lazarus

**Author's Note:**

> Jason has a lot of self-hatred issues, and doesn't think that he even deserves to be happy anymore. He's completely consumed by guilt over what's happened in the past between him and his family. In his mind, the best thing for everyone is if he wasn't there anymore. He's caused them too much pain already.
> 
> Whether or not I agree with Jason’s thought process is a completely different matter.

In the years since his return as the Red Hood, Jason Todd has changed a lot. True, he's not as recklessly violent and dangerous as he was when he first returned to Gotham, when the influence of the Lazarus Pit was still raging inside of him, but the Red Hood is still wildly volatile.

He's like a ticking bomb, one that the Batman can never be quite sure when it's going to go off.

It's that knowledge of Jason’s unpredictability that brings the Dark Knight to where he is now, zipping above buildings, through alleys and streets, as he makes his way across Gotham. The Red Hood had been spotted on the rooftops earlier, just standing and sitting and seemingly waiting for something. After strict orders that no one else engage (God forbid Jason was in the mood to take out some anger, or had been messing around in Gotham’s gangs again and was waiting for the inevitable war that would follow), Batman had left to investigate.

Now he's close enough see the bright red helmet discarded on the top of a building, and the Red Hood sitting on the ledge, feet dangling as he stares out at the Gotham skyline.

Batman’s landing is as silent and graceful as ever, but the expertly trained Red Hood is still up and leveling a gun to Batman’s chest before the man even has time to rise from his crouch.

“Red Hood,” says Batman, low and gravely, by way of greeting.

The hand holding the gun falls and Jason turns back to the skyline.

“Hood. What are you doing?” It doesn't come off as a question so much as a demand.

“It's beautiful, isn't it?” Asks Jason. His voice has a dreamy quality to it, soft and careless and unburdened. “Gotham. When I was a kid I used to climb the fire escape to watch the sun setting over the city whenever I could. Sometimes I'd stay there even after it was dark, just watching the lights illuminating the skyline.”

“Hood,” grinds out Batman again. He's not in the mood for games right now.

Jason doesn't look at him. The Batman is tense, mindset cold and clinical as he watches. Surely the Red Hood hasn't spent at least the last hour here just to reminisce. So what's the endgame? What is he planning?

“You know, we only had three books in our apartment,” says Jason suddenly, but his voice sounds…wrong. Slightly off. “One of them was the Bible.” His head tilts to the side. “I read that shit cover to cover; a million times.”

“Hood—” starts Batman, but he's cut off.

“You wanna know something interesting, Bruce? After being raised from the dead, that Lazarus guy? He went on to live for thirty more years. Became a bishop and everything. But in all of his second life…Lazarus? He never smiled. _Thirty years_ , and he never smiled. They say it was because he was haunted, disturbed by visions for the rest of his life. Guess he saw some shit while he was dead.” Jason laughs, but it’s completely hollow. “You gotta wonder…if four days in Hades did all that to him… What does six months do?”

“Jason…” All the questions Batman had been about to ask freeze in his throat as Jason turns to face him. The boy’s face is gaunt and emotionless, and his eyes are dull. _Empty_ , supplies Bruce’s mind, _he looks empty_.

Suddenly the situation clicks in Bruce’s mind: the high rooftop, Jason standing on the ledge, not angry, not attacking. Just standing.

“No one asked him if he wanted to be brought back. He was _dead_. Buried. He was gone, and they ripped his soul out of the void and shoved it back into his body and made him walk again.” Jason’s voice wavers. “ _No one asked him what he wanted_ ,” he whispers, and there's a faint tremor running through his whole body now.

“Jason,” commands Bruce, “Step back from the ledge.”

Jason doesn't move.

“ _Jason_ ,” Bruce takes a step forward; Jason matches his stride with a shuffle of his own, moving closer to the edge of the building. Bruce freezes.

“Lazarus wasn't supposed to come back, Bruce. And neither was I.”

“No, Jason, your return, it was—”

“A blessing? A miracle? Yeah. That's what Lazarus’s family said too.”

“Jason, please,” says Bruce, a desperate attempt, “Come home. We can help you.”

The shift in Jason’s body language is immediate. He tenses, and his lower lip quavers ever so slightly. “Don't do this, Bruce,” he whispers, pleads. “Please, don't. Don't pretend I'm still—” He steels himself; takes a deep breath. “I'm tired, Bruce. Tired of being this way. Tired of messing everything up. I'm not good, Bruce. For anyone. I'm… I'm so full of _hate_ , of hate and anger and bad things. Even…even before, I was always so angry. I can't get away from that. I _try_ , Bruce, I swear. _I want to be good_. But I'm not. I can't be helped. It's just who I am.”

Jason takes another deep breath, grounding himself further.

“I hated you,” he says. His voice doesn't falter now, and Bruce thinks this part might have been rehearsed. (He thinks that makes it even worse: if Jason had practiced this speech then this was premeditated. If Bruce wasn't here on this rooftop to hear these words, would they have been sent in a recording? A note? How long had Jason been considering this?)

“When I first came back. I hated you, because Joker was still alive, and you had replaced me, and you had moved on.”

“Jay—”

“But I don't hate you anymore. I was wrong, then. You moved on because you had to. It was selfish of me to believe that you shouldn't have been allowed to keep going. That because I died, you shouldn't be allowed to live.

“I hated Dick, too. Before it was because he was never around, because when he was it was to fight with you, because he looked at me and I knew that he hated me too. He hated me, and I never understood why, until I came back and saw Tim for the first time. Dick hated me because _I_ was _his_ replacement. And then, after, I hated him because for all that he had always hated me, he loved Tim. And because of that I hated Tim. Because he had everything that I ever wanted. He was Robin, and you loved him, and Dick adored him. He had the family that I had always wanted, and you three were happy. And I took it out on Tim. I _hurt_ him, because I was so angry, so jealous of him. Out of all of you, he was the one I hated the most, and he didn't deserve any of it.”

Jason's breath shudders. Silent tears roll down his cheeks, and Bruce is too overwhelmed by the sudden confessions to say anything.

“Then Damian came along, and I hated you even more, because he had killed people too, killed more than I had, but you took him in anyway. And I hated him because he was a snarky, entitled little asshole, and he hated me back, but I didn't care, because that's when I realized that I _deserved_ to be hated. He had killed people just like I had, but you didn't care, and you could forgive him, because he was letting you help him. And that was when I realized it was _me_. _I_ was the problem. _I_ was the reason I'd fallen so far.

“I had killed people, and I had hurt you and Dick and Tim, and I had pushed everyone away and told myself that it was you who was to blame, always you, for everything. But it wasn't. _I_ was what was wrong. It was _my_ fault that I was alone. _My_ fault that I was so angry all the time. _My_ fault that I couldn't be a part of your family anymore. _My_ fault that…that I ever died in the first place. I was reckless, and I thought I could do everything alone, and I died because of that.

“So I stopped hating you, all of you, because I couldn't anymore. I couldn't hate you guys for having what I wanted, because I didn't deserve to have that happiness in the first place. I stopped killing, too, because I wanted to show you that I could. Even after everything, I was still the little Robin: desperate for Batman’s approval. I knew that it was too late, that I had pushed too far away, that I couldn't be forgiven, but at least now I knew that it was me who had ruined everything…”

Jason's voice fades out for a moment. He swallows. “So… so I don't hate you anymore. Any of you. And I'm… I'm so sorry. For everything. I just wanted you to know that. I didn't… I didn't want you to think that…”

He falters again. A look of contemplation crosses his face, and he says, almost conversationally: “Willis told me that once, you know? That I ruin everything I touch… I guess he was right.”

“ ** _No_** ,” chokes out Bruce, roughly, fiercely, finally regaining his voice. “ _No_ , Jason, that's not…you haven't ruined anything. It's _not_ too late. You haven't pushed too far away. You could _never_ push too far. You're my _son_ , Jason, that hasn't changed. Nothing you could ever do would change that.”

“I'm not that boy anymore,” says Jason, almost mournfully, shaking his head. “He died in Ethiopia. What came back…it wasn't him.”

“You _are_. _my_. _son_ ,” Bruce repeats, accentuating each word.

“No,” replies Jason softly, resigned, and he's smiling sadly now. “I'm just a Good Soldier.”

Bruce inhales sharply. Images of the memorial in the Batcave—the engraved plaque that sits beneath it, reading _Jason Todd: A Good Soldier_ —‘My partner, my soldier, my fault’—only a warrior, never a child, never a son—flash unbidden in his mind, the words searing themselves across his brain in a flash of horrible guilt.

“Bye, Bruce,” whispers Jason.

Then he tips backwards over the ledge.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

  
Someone catches him—the grapple line goes taut with the sudden added weight—and slams into the wall with enough force to break bones.

 

 

The Batman is still frozen.

 

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> Dick probably caught him.
> 
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> 
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> 
> come scream with me on [Tumblr](https://nadyuiska.tumblr.com)


End file.
